I do not have room to carry a lot of cleaning supplies on the boat. I use baking soda and vinegar to clean the head. I was looking for something I could make for general cleaning. My criteria is the cleaning solution had to environmentally safe and it had to be made from ingredients I already have on the boat (and use for other purposes). After some reading and experimentation, I developed the following formula
1/4 cup vinegar
10 drops essential sweet orange oil.
1 tsp castile soap
2 cups of water
I use fragrance-free castile soap to clean myself and I keep plenty of white vinegar aboard. The only new ingredient is the essential oil. I chose sweet orange because a product I use as a wood treatment has a similar smell. This cleaner is effective at cutting grease, and is therefore good in the galley. I fill a spray bottle with the solution,
I remember the day in 2014 I became addicted to chai tea. I had just finished the Larapinta Trail, a 139 mile-long walking track in the Northern Territory of Australia. (from east to west, with the eastern end at Alice Springs and the western end at Mount Sonder, one of the territory’s highest mountains. It follows the West MacDonnell Ranges, sometimes along the ridge line, other times on the plain below, in the West MacDonnell National Park. I had returned to Alice Springs and treated myself to a cafe where I sat pondering the menu and nursing my blisters. On a whim, I ordered chai tea, something I had never had before. It arrived as a steaming kettle of water and a sachet of fresh herbs and spices. It was ambrosia. When I returned to the US, I tried to source “good” chai tea and was disappointed with everything I tried. Being the scientist I am, I decided to experiment with recipes. I kept a notebook and with each batch, I fiddled with the formula.
What follow is the final product (the hot links are to Amazon), a concoction I drink almost every day. I even have a milk frother on the boat!
I measure the ingredients with a small kitchen scale and usually make a double batch at a time.
Mix the spices and store in a ziplock bag (do not store with tea leaves).
Add to 4c water several tablespoons (to taste) of the spice mix and a couple of teaspoons of Assam tea leaves (to taste). Bring to boil, then reduce to simmer 5-10 minutes. In the meantime, steam unflavored and unsweetened Silk soy milk (I use a Breville Milk Café Frother). Remove tea from the heat. Add honey (I use Nates raw unfiltered honey to taste) and a teaspoon of vanilla extract (I use Watkins baking vanilla). Filter the spice/tea/honey/vanilla mixture. Note: throw away the precipitate at the bottom as it will make your tea bitter. I store the tea in a thermos. Add 2-3 times more tea than steamed soy milk (to taste) and mix. Spoon a little foam on the top.
This blog post has been created using the WordPress add-on Postie by sending an e-mail to a special e-mail account that is used only for creating posts. Together with Iridium GO Exec, this is how I intend to contribute to my blog while sailing in blue waters. And now, here is a gratuitous photograph of my prop, which I have just painted with Prop Speed.
Note the image quality is relatively poor. This is because the Iridium DataHub automatically reduces the image resolution to facilitate data transmission over the Iridium network. This is necessary because unlike the Starlink network, which has low orbit satellites and therefore relatively fast transmission speeds and short latency, the Iridium network has high orbit satellites and much less bandwidth.
One last point … when offshore, I do not have the bandwidth to load this website, so I am actually posting blind. There will no-doubt be mistakes that will have to be corrected when I am back in coastal waters and have access to the Internet.
